The Iowa Transportation Commission has approved state funding to build access to a site for a new company that will make metal food containers. Craig Markley of the Department of Transportation says Burlington will receive more than $1.3 million from what’s called an “Immediate Opportunity Grant.”
“The proposed improvements will result in the creation of 120 full-time jobs within three years, along with $125 million in associated capital investment,” Markley says. “Average wage of the created positions is 21 dollars, 15 cents per hour, which is 144 percent of the average labor-shed wage rate.” The director of the Greater Burlington Partnership David Toyer says they are excited about Silgan Container’s plans for the city.
“We’ve been working on this project with Silgan for quite a period of time. It was a very competitive process for them to make a site-location decision, and we’re really excited to be welcoming them to Burlington,” Toyer says.
The city is contributing nearly $340,000 that will extend the street to the area where the plant will be built. “We’ve got a 35-acre parcel that they’ve acquired in Burlington and they’re looking at building a 412,000 square foot facility for these 120 jobs,” Toyer explains. “It’s likely that there could be a potential even for that building to be a little larger before all is said and done. Part of the reason for the amount of acreage they wanted is they didn’t want to be land locked at a particular location.”
He says these will be new jobs, not relocated from another facility. “There’s two existing Silgan facilities in the state of Iowa. They have a facility in Fort Dodge and they have one in Fort Madison. The location of a facility in Burlington does not impact either of the operations at those existing plants,” Toyer says. He says the Burlington facility will make large metal containers that are not made at the other two Iowa facilities. The state money is part of the Revitalize Iowa’s Sound Economy, or RISE program.
